At Least We're Dreaming
by Sorrel
Summary: At least we're dreaming, at least we're alive..." Spike and Buffy run into each other. Sparks fly. Songfic.


**At Least We're Dreaming.**  The song is "At Least We're Dreaming" by Eve 6.

****

   Buffy sighed as she looked around.  She'd already only been patrolling for a few minutes, and already she was trying to find a way out of staying here any longer than she had to.  When had she slid so far down that she couldn't even care about the one mainstay in her life?  Slaying.  It had been part of her life for years, longer than anything had ever lasted since she had been Called, and of course it would be with her till the day she died.  Not that that was likely to be too far into the future, admittedly, but the principle remained.  It was the one thing that she always knew would remain constant, and no matter how much she complained about it, she loved it.

   Part of the problem, of course.  She was a human being, not just a weapon to mindlessly obey orders.  She kept the forces of darkness at bay under her own steam, and under her own command.  Her friends helped, and Giles directed her, but in the end she was all she had, and she was more than just "the Slayer."  That wasn't the sum total of her existence.  She was more than just a warrior.  She painted her nails, and worried about her hair, and had friends and loved and lost and laughed and cried just like any human girl.  _Normal_  human girl.  And yet here she was.  Slaying.  Because she loved it.

   But that was wrong too.  _Faith_ had loved Slaying, and look where she was now.  In jail for murder, because she'd liked her job just a bit too much.  And yet no matter how hard she tried to fight it, she was always here, in the graveyard after dark when all other sensible girls were either in bed or out on dates.  Because Spike had the right of it- he _always_ seemed to have the right of it, damn him- and part of her loved the thrill of the hunt and the kill.  And she was utterly alone because of it, she wasn't normal, wasn't right inside, because she was the Slayer and it seemed that in the end it truly did define her existence.  Maybe she was more than just a mindless killing machine, but everything in her life that had ever meant something had come to her either directly or indirectly because she was the Slayer.  Giles, more a father than the one whose genes she carried, her best friends, even her sister.

   And Angel.

_When do we get to the part where I can go home,   
Been hiding inside the jungle gym for way too long_

_Waiting for someone to come along and find me._

   Would she ever get to a place where it wouldn't hurt?  She'd been without him for two years now.  Two long years in which the world almost ended more than once and _still_ it burned, _still_ she missed him like she would miss an arm, a leg.

   Like she would miss her heart.

   Sure, she gone on to bury her pain and went out with someone who was as opposite from Angel as he could possibly be.  But even that died in the end _because you aren't good enough_ and he had left.  Poof.  Bye, Riley.  And she was alone again.

   Buffy was really very tired of being alone.  Was it too much to ask to have something that made her happy?  She was combing through the graveyard even though she knew that nothing was going to rise that night, and all because she didn't know what else to do.  She wanted to leave, though, and go do something else, anything else.  But Xander and Anya were having sex, and god knew that Willow and Tara were probably doing the same, and Giles was wonderful but shouldn't have to deal with her every little problem.  Even if this problem wasn't quite as little as she liked to pretend it was, by the light of day.  She could go home, see her sister and her mother, but somehow that felt... wrong.  Like she was going to contaminate them.

  No, tonight she needed something dark, and wrong.  Something nasty and vicious that would twist and hurt underneath her skin till she could feel alive again.  Less like stone.  Yeah, she needed something that would make her burn.

   Or someone.

_  
Live in an apartment that bums me out  
It don't get better when the lights go out  
Waiting for someone to come along and find me_

   Spike grumbled to himself as he shrugged into his duster.  There wasn't anything to do tonight.  Sure, he could cruise through the cemeteries, see if he could find anything worth fighting, but he doubted that anything was stirring.  And anything that was stirring, he thought as he caught a whiff of Buffy's scent drifting on the night air, wouldn't last long enough to be worth fighting.

   He stared longingly in the direction her scent had come from, but he couldn't see or hear anything, and he didn't want to see her anyway.  So there.  He turned determinedly away from that section of the cemetery and looked back into his crypt.  His tomb, his hellhole that was barely better than Xander Harris's basement, when he was still living in it and not shacking up with the demon bird.  Yeah, he had a great place.  A real chick-magnet.

   If they were into dark and dusty, and being surrounded by dead people and some mold colonies that were forming their own political system.

   He turned away with a grimace of distaste and set off in the opposite direction from Buffy.  Grocery store wasn't that far a walk, and he needed Weetabix anyway.  Had to have something to make his blood all crunchy, right?  It had nothing to do with the fact that going to the grocery store was a perfectly good way to _not_ go to Buffy, and he really hadn't taken the first excuse he could to get away from her and her... pull, the kind of pull that dragged on him from her hazel eyes and... no, of course he wasn't running away.  Spike never ran away.  He didn't have the sense to run away.

   Of course not.

_Swimming through the isles at the grocery store  
I don't even know what I'm looking for  
Waiting for someone to come along and find me  
  
_

   Spike stared blankly at the rows of cereal in the aisles, knowing exactly what it said on the sides of the boxes but not quite able to figure out which one he wanted, after all.  Something crunchy, to crumble up into his blood.  Right.  So which one was that again?

   He swung the little cart from one hand and sucked his lower lip in between his teeth, thinking.  He had no reason to be here, really.  He was only Here because it wasn't There.  Spike knew his limitations, and he knew that he was an incredibly stubborn man.  Vampire.  Whatever.  But despite his incredible stubbornness, he could, on occasion, force himself to see the truth.

  The truth being, in this case, that the only reason he was so afraid of There was because There was where Buffy was.

   "Spike, what the hell are you doing here?"

   _  
At least I'm breathing  
At least I'm alive  
As long as I'm dreaming  
Everything's gonna be alright  
  
_

   And suddenly There was Here, and it was all that he could do to keep his face smooth and calm and not turn and run the other direction.  He tilted his head, just a little bit, to look at her out of the corner of his eye.  Couldn't quite turn and face her, not yet.

   "'m buying cereal, Slayer.  And what would your fine self be doing in the _exact_ same aisle as I am?"

   To his delight, she looked uncomfortable.  He smiled inwardly to himself, smirk on his face where she could see it, and found it within him to be able to turn and look at her fully now.  "That's not on your business, Spike," she snapped, and he laughed out loud, to her face.

   Ignoring her glare, he said, still chuckling, "Of _course_ it's not my business.  Nothing ever is.  You're buggered if you haven't gotten that by now."

   He snatched a box of cereal off the shelves, not bothering to look at the label on the front, and brushed past her, the trailing edges of his duster curling around her legs.  She jumped away and glared at his back as he strode down the tiled floor, cereal box tucked under his coat where no cashiers could see it, and left the store.

   Anger and something else she didn't want to identify burning under her skin, she hurried after him.

_  
To the corner to call collect  
Your mother wants to know are you happy yet  
Waiting for someone to come along and find you  
  
_

   "Damn it, Spike, get your ass back here."

   Spike turned with a sigh and a glare.  "What the bleedin' hell do you want, Slayer?  You didn't get your rocks off by followin' me to the damn grocery store and botherin' me in the bloody cereal aisle, and so you chase me into the cemetery?  Very smooth, Slayer, very smooth.  A style like that'll get you a date any day."

   An angry flush rode high on her cheeks.  "Who are you to judge me?  And you stole that box of cereal."

   "Of course I stole the bloody box of cereal," Spike said sardonically.  "Try not to die of the shock.  And I have just as much right to judge you as you have to judge me.  Surprisingly enough, that hasn't stopped you yet."

   "There's a big difference between you and me, Spike.  I do good things, you do bad things.  I save people, you kill them.  I have a soul, you don't.  So on and so forth."

   "Yeah, and your precious _soul_ has got you so bloody _happy,_ of course," Spike snarled.  "Christ, Summers, look at your life.  You wander around and kill things and spout off all the lines the Watcher chap about destiny and being the Chosen one and never once do you even _think_ about what you're actually doing."

   Buffy opened her mouth to make some scathing comeback that would be a gem of its kind, Spike was sure, but he didn't care and overrode whatever was going to spill out of her mouth with his own intentionally cruel and all-too-accurate words.  "You're lonely, aren't you?  Can't have your One True Love because he knows better than you what your life is meant to be like.  Can't have your little farmboy because he couldn't actually touch your frozen little heart.  Your friends have each other and their own lives and your Watcher has his tea and crumpets and musty old tomes.  I have no guilt, no fears, no worries, no future, no past.  So tell me, Slayer- how is your life so much better than mine?"

_Going out at night looking for distractions  
Sleeping through the day there's no redemption  
Waiting for someone to come along and find you  
  
_

   And there were tears spilling out of her eyes and he felt a brief flash of something but she didn't break or even back down, not his Buffy.  "You want to know how my life is better than yours, Spike?" she said, her voice hard, and he felt a sudden urge to flee but made himself stand still.  He'd asked for this.

   "I have friends.  I have family.  I have people who love me.  I have a purpose in life. You sleep in a crypt all day, and wander around at night with nothing to do except kill demons because you have nothing better to do with your life.  You have no friends, no family.  Your little honey left you years ago because you weren't demon enough for her.  You're neutered, a helpless little bunny rabbit.  And still you have the nerve to ask me how my life is better than yours."

   He held himself still, forced himself not to cringe.  Yeah, he'd asked for it all right, and damn him if she hadn't given it to him but good.  Slowly he lifted one hand and rubbed his jaw, holding his face desperately calm so she couldn't see just how deeply every barb had dug.  "Well, Princess," he said casually.  "When you're right, you're right."

   He was almost recovered enough to be amused by her expression of shock, but... No, actually, he was most definitely recovered enough to be amused by her expression of shock.  Didn't even need to recover at all for that, actually.

   "You see, before now I hadn't realized everything that was wrong with my life.  Have to thank you for that, by the way.  Now I have to go brood, like some other vampire that we know.  Don't like a little monster in your man, do you?  Of course not, and that's why you don't walk down the factory at the edge of town sometimes, and curl up in bed and hug the pillow because it smells like him.  Of course your life is better than mine, Summers, but all I have to do to make me everything that you think I am is to take just a little taste of yours."

   He leaned down and pressed a hard, brutal kiss to her lips, then took off before she could hit him.  When she recovered from her shock, he was gone.

_  
At least I'm breathing  
At least I'm alive  
As long as I'm dreaming  
Everything's gonna be alright  
  
_

   Buffy was tired, and she knew it.  One too many demons in one night, but what irritated her the most is that it wasn't the nest of scaly ones that she'd cleaned out that had her so exhausted, but the short encounter with the one with the face of the man that had gotten her.  She dragged her way upstairs, not even bothering to say hi to Dawn, and locked her bedroom door as soon as she'd shut it.  She toed off her boots, dropped her jacket on the floor, and shut off the light before collapsing on the bed, but she didn't fall asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.  No, her body may have been exhausted and battered, but her mind was wide awake and wouldn't stop running.

    Spike.  He'd kissed her, and she'd... done nothing.  Just stood there while he laid his lips against her and took off.  The pig, the disgusting, arrogant, evil....

   Seductive, dangerous, exciting.....

   No, better not to go there.  What he'd said, about her liking a little monster in her man... It hit a little too close to home, and she just didn't want to think about it.  Better to just go to sleep, and not think about the gleam of moonlight on white-blonde hair, or the way his lips twisted when he smirked, or the way his shirt clung to the hard, sculpted muscles of his chest and stomach.

   She finally dropped off to sleep, and when she did she dreamed, and she dreamed of him.

_  
I'm alright, I tell myself twice  
In the mirror before I can't go to sleep at night  
I need a lullaby I need some time_

   Spike grumbled to himself under his breath as he wandered between the headstones, on his way back to his crypt.  He had to lose his temper.  He always had to lose his friggin' temper, it seemed like, or his patience or, more frequently, his mind.  Not that fighting with Buffy- or getting smacked around by her, since he couldn't hit back- wasn't a fairly frequent occurrence, but pulling her close and kissing her... that was bloody stupid, and he knew it.  She was going to avoid him like the plague now, no doubt about it.

   Still.  A little smile curled the corner of his lips as he opened the door and slammed it shut behind him, throwing himself down into the armchair set up in front of the tv.  It had been worth it, really.  Worth it to see the look on her face, worth it to know that she was probably too furious to think about anything but him, and most definitely worth it to finally know what she tasted like.  It felt like he'd been wondering for years, and now he finally knew.

   He sat in silence and stared at the flickering TV screen for a while, but finally gave up and went to bed.  His empty bed.  Christ, he sometimes grew tired of falling asleep as the sun rose, and knowing that he was falling asleep alone.  But it wasn't anything he hadn't gotten used to long ago, and so as he closed his eyes he reassured himself that some day, he would get the girl.

   And when he slept, he dreamed of her.

_At least we're breathing_

_At least we're alive_

_As long as we're dreaming_

_Everything's gonna be alright..._


End file.
